1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a rendering device to render contents, a recording device to record contents, and a copy control method.
2. Description of the Background Art
The copy control of the literary work is performed based on a CCI (copy control information). In the CCI, there are two types of a digital CCI (D-CCI) and a watermark CCI (WM-CCI). The digital CCI is the digital information which is associated with the literary work which is the digital data. Moreover, the watermark CCI is the digital information embedded in the literary work by using a watermark technology. The watermark CCI can be detected from among the literary works expressed as the analog signal.
For instance, the image contents are expressed as the digital data of the MPEG2 format, and are recorded on the contents storage media. The digital CCI can be associated with the corresponding digital data. The digital CCI cannot be detected in the rendered image contents, while the watermark CCI embedded in the image contents can be detected from the rendered image contents.
In the CCI, there are at least four following kinds of CCIs (CF, CO, CNM, CN). In general, a “CF” shows that contents can be freely copied. A “CO” shows that contents are permitted to perform the copy only once. When the contents whose CCI is “CO” are copied, the CCI of the contents made by the copy is set to a “CNM”. The “CNM” and “CN” show that the copy of the corresponding contents data is not permitted. The “CNM” is set to the contents made by the copy of the contents whose CCI is the “CO” as mentioned above. On the other hand, the “CN” is different from the “CNM” at a point that the “CN” is set to the contents from which the copy is prohibited.
It is especially called a “Remark” to change the watermark CCI from the “CO” to the “CNM” when the contents are copied.
The recording device decides right or wrong of the copy of the contents based on the CCI, and performs the recording operation. This is called a copy control based on the CCI.
The literary work might be recorded on the media. The media which stores the literary work might have information which is called a media identifier. The media identifier has at least two kinds of media identifiers of an ROM and an RWM. The ROM shows that the corresponding media is a read only media and is not writable. The RWM shows that the corresponding media is readable and writable.
In the copy control by the conventional watermark CCI, it is necessary to check the watermark and perform the remark when recording according to circumstances. It is similar to the contents data input from the secure input.
The secure input of the recording device is connected with the secure output of other devices. The mutual authentication of the device is performed usually. In addition, the communication between corresponding devices is usually protected by encoding, and the falsification of the communication data is difficult. The digital CCI accompanies the contents data input from the secure input. It is preferable to perform the copy control based on only the digital CCI.
However, the detection and the remark of the watermark CCI are performed to the contents data input from the secure input in the conventional copy control. This is necessary treatment to keep the consistency to the recording of the insecure input in a state that the contents are recorded on the contents storage media.
The input data from the secure input is encoded usually. It is necessary to decode the contents data to detect and remark the watermark CCI. The recording of the secure input is basically a copy operation of the digital data, and a high-speed recording can be performed originally. The detection and the remark of the watermark CCI are the troubles of the high-speed recording.